alliance
by not a straight trumpet
Summary: Natsuki and Kumiko start a GSA.


**a/n: **i wasn't able to find much info about gsas in japanese schools - if they exist at all - so i apologize if this is inaccurate - much of it comes from my own experiences, as i was a co-leader of a gsa when i was in high school

the title of this document is "natsuki nakagawa said gay rights"

* * *

"Taki-sensei gave you the approval, huh?" Kumiko looked up from her phone to see Natsuki waving a slip of paper around, triumphant.

"Yep! He said as long as it didn't interfere with being the VP he'd sit in as the advisor and stuff. Don't tell Kousaka, but I think there's something up between him and Hashimoto-sensei."

"I thought, uh, I thought everyone knew that." Natsuki shrugged.

"She's pretty dense when she wants to be. Anyway, that's what _this _is for." Smacking the paper down on the desk with a grin, Kumiko could just barely make out the words.

"'Kitauji High School GSA. All are welcome.'"

"Figured it ought to be short and to the point - wouldn't wanna scare people off, right?"

"Right." Kumiko kneaded at the desk with her hand, relief - strange relief - coursing through her body.

"And if you want - if you're not too busy with, y'know, whatever that mess with Tsukamoto is - I am gonna need a co-leader. Can't really run this sorta thing on my own."

"I-I guess not." She knew what the answer would be before she even opened her mouth. "Yeah, I'll do it."

"Awesome! Now, I've just gotta get some paperwork in order and then ya can help me tack up fliers, get the word out, that sort of thing."

"Yeah." Kumiko's heart swelled.

* * *

It turned out that co-running Kitauji High School's first ever GSA was a lot more paperwork and a lot less finding mutual understanding than Kumiko had thought - a fact that was not unaffected by Natsuki's precarious position with her feet in two ponds, so to speak, when it came to running clubs.

(Was that the saying? She didn't know.)

In any case, after they'd managed to find the right classroom and the right time and everything else, she stood with her hands fiddling with a tiny pride flag that Natsuki had brought from home, presiding over a table of enticing cookies and things bought with the club's (small) budget in a room that was empty save for Natsuki and herself.

"Y'know, it's not the worst thing in the world if nobody else shows up," Natsuki said, taking a bite out of one of the cookies. "We could just have, like, movie marathons or something. I haven't seen _Imagine Me and You _in a while."

"You watch that movie all the time. I'm, uh, pretty sure you could quote it from memory at this point."

"And?" Natsuki finished off the cookie. "It's a good movie."

"It is." Kumiko's fingernail caught on a loose thread in the flag - she untangled it before it could unravel the whole thing. "B-but yeah, I hope we get other people. It's a good thing you're doing, Natsuki."

"Hey, don't get all weepy on me now. I've still got another year before graduation, wouldn't wanna wear out all that sad energy before then."

"You're humble."

"I know." Natsuki took a fake bow. "Chin up, kiddo. There's absolutely no way we're the only two queers in this school."

She was right about that, at least - not a minute later, Ririka cracked open the door, her freckled face peeping through. She looked like a Nancy Drew figure, seeking out clues to a mystery, but if Natsuki noticed that she was tactful enough to keep quiet about it.

"Hey, you're the other oboe, right?"

"You know Yoroizuka-senpai?" Ririka's face brightened. "I actually told her maybe she should come, but she had some kind of engagement with Kasaki-senpai, so I let them be. She's so cool, though, right?"

"Told ya," Natsuki whispered. Kumiko elbowed her.

"Ah, Kenzaki-san, right?" she said, holding out one of the cookie platters. Ririka tentatively reached out a hand, hovering over it. "Y-you can take it. That's what they're here for."

"Did you make these?" Ririka took one of the cookies, practically quivering with excitement. Kumiko couldn't help but feel a bit of warmth in her chest.

"Nah." Natsuki shrugged, leaning on the desk, eyebrows raised. "We bought 'em. I can't bake for crap."

"I can't, either," Kumiko added. Satisfied, Ririka plopped down in one of the chairs set up in a sort of haphazard half-circle around the room.

"How does this work, then?"

"We didn't really think that far," Natsuki admitted. The sun was still bright through the window, but Kumiko knew it'd go down soon. "Gonna wait for everyone else before we start talking, but . . . favorite movies, I guess?"

"Favorite movies?" Ririka echoed.

"What are your favorite movies, is what I meant."

"Oh! I don't watch movies very much, but I saw this one _amazing _drama a few weeks ago . . ."

* * *

In the following minutes, more of Kitauji's brightest filtered into the little classroom - students from outside the band who Kumiko didn't know at all, girls from outside the band who Natsuki _definitely _knew, considering the way they all gave her flirty little half-waves, and a surprising scattering of band members, too. Mirei shuffled in with her usual awkward/cold/uncomfortable air, Yuuko walked with her shoulders down and her head high, and Kanade sat down without saying a word, Motomu in tow.

"Alright," Natsuki clapped her hands together, more a leader here than she'd ever seemed up at the conductor's stand, and Kumiko thought quietly that this was . . . definitely a place she belonged, a fish in the greatest and most wondrous body of water. She wondered if her friend would stay with the euphonium after she graduated, where she would go. "Seems like we're about at capacity, so I'll just wait for the proctor to show up, yeah? In the meantime . . . name, pronouns, and- shit, Kumiko, what was the icebreaker we decided on?"

"Uh, if you were a vending machine, what w-would you vend?"

"Vending machine! That's it. Alright, get to it." Natsuki sank into her chair at the front, pushing her hair out of her face, the very epitome of cool. "I need a haircut."

"Do you want to start?" Kumiko whispered. Natsuki nodded.

"Natsuki, she/her, and if I was a vending machine I'd vend these things." She waved around the little pride flag for emphasis. Kanade raised her hand. "Yeah?"

"Does it have to be a concrete thing?"

"The vending machine question?"

"Yes."

"It's . . . it's a hypothetical question, we're just tryin' to get to know ya better. Whatever feels right."

"Hmm." Kanade looked down at her desk, clearly trying her hardest to come up with something.

"We'll just go back to ya. Any others?" One of the girls from outside the band - one of Natsuki's "friends" - sat up.

"I'm Yuki, she/her, and I'd vend-"

"Is this the right room? It's gotta be the right room, Kousaka-san, there's a little poster on the wall and everything." The door was open, but the voice's owner came from behind it, out of sight. Kumiko shook her head. That couldn't be right. "I'm scared of being seen as a gay too, but we have to be . . . supportive, right? Because that's why we're both here." An accusatory slant to the voice. "That's what you said when I realized we were on the same route."

"Hey, stranger." Natsuki folded her arms across her chest. "Ya gonna come in here or not? I won't judge either way." Her tone was rough, but Kumiko knew she was telling the truth. Cautiously, Hazuki crept out from behind the door, holding the arm of someone who stole Kumiko's breath in a second.

Reina.

"We're not together," Hazuki started, immediately, breaking off her hold on Reina's arm as soon as she came into view. "At all. Definitely not in a gay way. This is an alliance, right? So I'm not doing this because girls are pretty, even though they are! Girls are very pretty! But I'm here to support my friends! I just ran into Kousaka-san on the way here."

"Hello," Reina said, robotic, possibly nervous? Kumiko couldn't tell. Reina did a good job of keeping her mask up in public.

"Definitely not dating," Hazuki continued as she walked in and sat down next to Mirei. "She's not even my type! Hypothetically. If I was into girls."

"Easy on the no-homo train, Katou," Natsuki sighed. Hazuki stiffened, and it almost looked like she was blushing. Yuuko shot her a glare. "We're not here to ask any questions."

"Right, okay." Hazuki wrung her hands together. "So is it, like, a normal part of growing up to think girls are really pretty? I mean, I think boys are really pretty too, and I've heard of people who aren't either, but . . ."

"Take a breath. Have a cookie. It's all good here." Natsuki nudged Kumiko, who was still taking in the utter strangeness of the whole scene, to see Reina standing uncomfortably in the middle of the room. She kept looking around, lost, almost. Yuuko gestured to the empty spot next to her. Natsuki looked at her with a silent gesture of gratitude. "As I was saying, name, pronouns, vending machine, go."

"I'm-"

"Nakagawa-san, you wrote the starting time as five on the flyer. You've gotta tell an old man these little changes, I wasn't expecting a whole audience!" Hashimoto stepped in, a mug of coffee with the words "WORLD'S BEST DRUMMER" on it in Papyrus font sloshing about with his movements. "Taki-kun's busy, and Sato-chan couldn't make it today - had to meet with Yoroizuka-san for something - but she sends her regards. Says this kinda thing would've been 'invaluable to her development in high school' or somethin' equally fancy. You know how she is."

"I don't," Kumiko and Natsuki both admitted, too quiet to be heard.

"I do," Ririka said.

"Anyway, let's get this show on the road, shall we?" Hashimoto plucked one of the last remaining cookies off a tray. "Good job, Nakagawa-san. You too, Oumae-san. Taki-kun's got big expectations for you, it's nice to see that the band isn't your whole life or anything."

Kumiko couldn't bring to tell him how much of a reprieve this was, how much she really did love the band but hated the way the flower pin caught in her hair and how _he_ always scrutinized that, right behind her, making some joke about how it was trapped there.

But she liked the euphonium - loved it, really - and she wouldn't trade it for the world.

Still, Shuichi wasn't here, probably didn't even give the flyers a second glance, and that meant she could breathe a little easier.

"T-thank you, Hashimoto-sensei," she mumbled. "That, uh, means a lot."

"You're good kids." Nostalgia seemed to cloud Hashimoto's cartoonish glasses, and he pressed a great big hand on the desk. "Now, who's ready for some icebreakers?" The room collectively groaned.

"I think my vending machine's broken," Yuuko said, and Natsuki burst out into laughter.

* * *

The meeting passed in a blur of introductions and conversations and rapid-fire banter, and Kumiko was all but trembling with excitement by the end of it. Pretty much everyone had left - citing homework, a need to get home, or anything else - so Natsuki and Kumiko stood together in the room again, watching the sun set.

"So much for watching _Imagine Me and You_ again, huh?" Kumiko joked. Natsuki shrugged.

"Eh, I'll survive. Besides, I still haven't shown it to Yuuko. I think she'll love it."

"Me too." Kumiko put the last of the cookie boxes into the trash, crunching them down with her shoe to keep them from spilling out. "It's . . . it's r-really nice that you're doing this, Natsuki. Important and stuff."

"You sound like Niiyama-sensei." Natsuki pushed a chair into place. "I'm not going to music college."

"I, uh, never thought you were."

"Still. It's nice to say that out loud - I'm actually going to the same uni as Yuuko, can ya believe it? What a twist of fate, huh?"

"Fate, yeah," Kumiko echoed. Natsuki hopped up onto the desk, steadying herself as it wobbled.

"Okay, out with it. What's wrong?"

"What do you think?" Kumiko fished the hairpin out of her pocket, held it out like an offering. Natsuki sat very still for a moment.

"Does he make you happy?" she asked. Kumiko shook her head, slowly, and then faster and faster until she felt dizzy. Natsuki shrugged.

"Well, that should answer it. Heteronormativity's a bitch. I'm not gonna be the one defining anything for ya, but I think the one you love is waiting outside. Break it off with the guy; he'll find some girl who's into . . . all that, for whatever reason. You'll both be better off for it." Natsuki looked her dead in the eye, then, her expression almost familial in this light. "Besides, you're Kitauji's top-billed euph. You can do anything with enough blood and sweat and tears and friends or whatever."

"Y-yeah." Kumiko balled her hand into a fist, started to head out. "Natsuki?"

"Hrm?"

"Thanks."

* * *

Music was important to her, there were no 'buts' about that - the euphonium was an extension of herself, as much as an arm or leg would be - and she realized with stunning clarity that there was not room for . . . for muddling her head with a futile attempt to fit into what the rest of the school nodded along with.

And of course Reina had helped with that, which was why she found herself panting as she trudged up the hill that she had started to see as belonging to Reina and nobody else. Rationally, of course, other people were there sometimes, sitting on those benches beneath the little pseudo-gazebo and surveying the school from far enough away that everyone else looked like ants, but it was Reina's spot.

Kumiko sat down next to her wordlessly.

"Yoshikawa-senpai is nice," Reina said, hands folded in her lap. "She's a good president."

"Yeah." Kumiko paused. "Why were you there today?"

"That's not a question I can answer all that easily." Reina looked out towards the setting purple sky. "Why were you?"

"Oh, I'm the co-leader, along w-with Natsuki."

"Ah." Reina hummed a little, a few bars of something familiar that Kumiko couldn't place. "It was nice. I think I'll go back next week."

"Me too."

"Walk home with me?" Reina stood, offered her hand. Kumiko's heart sped up. "It's getting dark out - I don't have my trumpet with me, either, since today was an off day, so there isn't much to do on the train back."

"Yeah." Kumiko took her hand, marveled in how warm and perfect it felt, but of course neither of them were perfect, and that was fine in the end. She took the invitation for what it was, brushed some leaves off her skirt, and set off with Reina into the indigo night.

* * *

**a/n:** the vending machine question was actually something we did - it'd been around for as long as i could remember and i have no idea who started it.


End file.
